The deities and spirits served by the bimo, the hereditary priestly specialists of the Yi people of Yunnan, Sichuan and Guizhou in southwestern China, together with the ancestral spirits their ritual texts address. Bimo transmit a large written corpus in a distinct Yi script, used for funerary rites, exorcism and divination, that predates the standardised Yi syllabary created in the twentieth century. Yi religion, sometimes called Bimoism, is practised today, and the bimo tradition has drawn growing scholarly attention as one of the region's few indigenous priestly literate traditions.
Facts
Structure
Structure of the PantheonLocal and lineage cults gathered under one name, with no single frame 1 Divine HeadshipNo sovereign; the gods act as peers 1 Succession Between Divine GenerationsOne divine generation; no succession between generations is recorded 1 Attestation
Era of AttestationDocumented in the outside record through the bimo manuscript tradition from the Ming period; held by its custodians to be far older 1 Veneration TodayActively venerated in a living tradition 1 Cult
Principal Cult CentreNo single centre. Observance is held at the household and the lineage, under the bimo ritual specialist 1 Organisation
Membership of the PantheonEvery place, clan and lineage adds its own 1 How Mortals Enter the PantheonAncestors and founders become objects of cult 1 Sources
Primary SourceThe bimo manuscripts, written in the Yi script and recited by bimo ritual specialists, with published ethnography 1 Connections
Associated With
This source names China directly: "Sichuan and Guizhou in southwestern China, together with the ancestral spirits their ritual texts address."
Source Encyclopedia of ReligionMircea Eliade (ed.); Lindsay Jones (ed., 2nd ed.)
Source Encyclopedia of ReligionMircea Eliade (ed.); Lindsay Jones (ed., 2nd ed.)
Source Encyclopedia of ReligionMircea Eliade (ed.); Lindsay Jones (ed., 2nd ed.)
Source Encyclopedia of ReligionMircea Eliade (ed.); Lindsay Jones (ed., 2nd ed.)
Sources
1. Encyclopedia of Religion
Mircea Eliade (ed.); Lindsay Jones (ed., 2nd ed.), Macmillan Reference, 2005View the Source Reader Challenges (0)
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